Funds are requested to provide partial support for the 30th annual meeting of the Society for the Study of Reproduction (SSR), to be held August 2-5, 1997 at the Red Lion Hotel, Jantzen Beach, Portland, Oregon. Specifically, funds are sought for four aspects of the meeting: (1) the President's Symposium entitled "Structure and Function of Lactogenic Hormones", (2) three State-of-the-Art Lectures highlighting recent advances in different research fields, and (3) twelve mini-Symposia (36 speakers) designed to provide greater breadth and to generate discussion on emerging areas in reproductive sciences; and (4) travel awards for trainees (pre- and post-doctoral level), who are non-NRSA recipients. The lactogenic hormones have not been the topic of an SSR Symposium for at least 15 years. The Symposium will highlight lactogenic hormones, their signal transduction mechanisms and their role(s) in uterine biology. Three young and distinguished researchers, Drs. Michael Soares, Li-yuan Yu-Lee and Beverly Chilton, will provide a comparative view arising from molecular, to cellular and to whole-animal studies in the rabbit, pig and nonhuman primate. The Symposium will include a panel discussion of unresolved issues, species similarities and differences, and future directions of research. The State-of-the-Art Lectures will be given by three internationally-recognized scientists. Dr. Fred Fay will discuss highly sophisticated flourescence deconvolution imaging technologies to monitor intracellular signals. Dr. Kathleen H. Young will present recent research on expression of both ligand and receptor in bacterial systems to study association and higher order protein structures important for cell activation and signal transduction. Dr. Carolyn Smith will discuss interactions between growth factors and nuclear steroid hormone receptors required for cellular responses. In addition, mini-symposia (4 per day within a 90-minute time slot) will allow three speakers on a related area of emerging interest (e.g., molecular events of sperm capacitation) to present their findings and discuss issues. The general informality of the meeting facilitates interaction between scientists and trainees; the majority of papers presented as 10-minute platform talks or in poster sessions are given by students. Travel awards will allow many more trainees to attend the SSR meeting than otherwise would be possible due to limited laboratory funds.